Soul cakes were also offered for the souls themselves to eat, or the ‘soulers’ would act as their representatives.As with the Lenten tradition of hot cross buns, soul cakes were often marked with a cross, indicating they were baked as alms. Shakespeare mentions souling in his comedy The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1593). While souling, Christians would carry “lanterns made of hollowed-out turnips”, which could have originally represented souls of the dead; jack-o’-lanterns were used to ward off evil spirits. On All Saints’ and All Souls’ Day during the 19th century, candles were lit in homes in Ireland, Flanders, Bavaria, and in Tyrol, where they were called “soul lights”, that served “to guide the souls back to visit their earthly homes”. In many of these places, candles were also lit at graves on All Souls’ Day.In Brittany, libations of milk were poured on the graves of kinfolk, or food would be left overnight on the dinner table for the returning souls; a custom also found in Tyrol and parts of Italy.